


making heavens out of less

by labellelunaclaire



Series: AUgust 2020 [3]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: AU-gust 2020, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Aziraphale Loves Crowley (Good Omens), Crowley Loves Aziraphale (Good Omens), Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), M/M, Oblivious Aziraphale (Good Omens)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-04
Updated: 2020-08-04
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:42:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25720768
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/labellelunaclaire/pseuds/labellelunaclaire
Summary: Day 3 — SoulmatesThere used to be soulmates in Heaven. But they stopped talking about them after the Fall.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Series: AUgust 2020 [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1860763
Comments: 8
Kudos: 67
Collections: AUgust 2020





	making heavens out of less

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be up yesterday, but, well, it wasn't, because I work full time and life is hard. But it's done now and I'm actually happy with how it turned out! Got a few more Good Omens fics lined up for this month, so keep an eye out!

Aziraphale used to fantasize about finding his soulmate. Everyone in Heaven was supposed to have one, it was just a matter of discovering who yours was.

And then came the Fall, and all talk of soulmates was banned.

“Look, just speaking statistically,” Gabriel explained in his usual way that had a way of making one feel like a very small, particularly stupid, human child. “At least _some_ of the so-called _‘soulmates’_ ,” he used air quotes around the word, “ _must_ have been on the other side of the… _incident_ . And _therefore_ , we have to conclude that soulmates were never truly a thing to begin with. Demons don’t have souls, so how could they have — or _be_ — soulmates, afterall?”

He said it with such conviction that Aziraphale couldn’t even begin to form an argument to the contrary.

But it still just didn’t sit right with him.

He _must_ have a soulmate somewhere, surely. There was an ache in his chest, a longing he could feel in his very bones. At times he felt so overwhelmed with the feeling of love that he could barely stand it. As an angel, he was so very sensitive to the emotion that it was like a tidal wave that aimed to pull him under, never to return to the surface.

He tried not to think about it. Push it to the back of his mind. Pretend the gaping wound in his soul wasn’t there. He didn’t search for his soulmate, didn’t analyze every interaction he had with any new angel he met, didn’t hope that each time he was sent to Heaven would be the time he encountered them, whoever they might be.

It was fine, being alone. Really. _Truly_. After all, Aziraphale had his books. He had his friends throughout the years. Oscar and Herman and Walt and Emily and Bram and all the other brilliantly creative creatures he’d encountered, watched them traverse through the trials and tribulations of life, witnessed their highest highs and lowest lows, and one by one, said a final goodbye to them, knowing that he would never see most of them again in death.

He had Crowley, the one constant in his millenia on Earth. His best friend. The only other being who knew what it was like to be him.

Perhaps that should have been his first clue.

They weren’t meant to be friends. Not even acquaintances. Heaven knew nothing of their relationship, because Aziraphale was certain from the beginning that he and Crowley should not be interacting, that Heaven would not approve. So he just… never said anything to them about it. Because he couldn’t be reprimanded for his actions if they didn’t know.

“So they just think that you and I have been circling around each other for centuries and never actually interacted?” Crowley asked one night in, oh, probably sometime in the fifteenth century (it was hard to remember exactly the timeline after so very long), when the two of them were both firmly three sheets to the wind in a little pub.

“I’m very good at avoiding you, you see,” Aziraphale responded, pouring more wine into his glass. “You’ve no idea that I’m even here on Earth.”

The demon let out a snorting laugh and held out his glass for the angel to refill it. “Oh, you must be _very_ good indeed, Angel.”

It wasn’t the first time Crowley had called him _angel_ , but it was the first time that it sent a little flutter through Aziraphale’s heart. It felt so… so _personal._ So warm. He felt flustered and frozen and spilled a little wine as he stiffly poured Crowley another glass.

It wasn’t the first time that Crowley had called him _angel_ , but it was the first time that Aziraphale realized he would do _anything_ to have him call him that again.

That probably should have been his next clue.

In the beginning, Aziraphale and Crowley would sometimes go hundreds of years between interactions. And that was fine. Really, it was. Aziraphale had a lot of work to do, performing Heavenly miracles on Earth, winning over souls for the side of good and God. They certainly weren’t _friends,_ no matter how exciting it always was when they did cross paths. Crowley was an enigma to Aziraphale, a puzzle he couldn’t quite solve. He certainly didn’t act like he assumed most demons acted (not that he had much experience with demons besides Crowley), and while mischievous and cunning, Aziraphale could hardly describe Crowley as _bad_ or _evil._

The longer they were on Earth, the closer their relationship became, and the less time there was between their visits with each other. They created the Arrangement. They went out for drinks. They saw plays. Crowley tempted him with delicious meals and tiny sweeties from little shops he found during his assignments. It was nice. It was _fun._ And slowly, ever so slowly, Aziraphale couldn’t imagine his existence without the demon by his side.

Another clue that he ardently ignored.

Aziraphale was happy to keep his thoughts about Crowley and his thoughts about soulmates completely separate. Because, to him, they simply couldn’t exist in the same space. For, surely, if he _were_ to find his soulmate, he would have to give up Crowley. And to fully have Crowley, his best friend, his companion through all that happened on Earth, he would have to abandon his search for his soulmate. So he kept them segregated in his mind, so that he never thought about either at the same time.

The clues should have been piling up.

He felt so stupid when they finally came crashing down on him.

He remembered the pain he felt when Crowley asked him for holy water, the ice cold fear that shot through his chest like an arrow as he read the words on that blasted slip of paper.

He shouldn’t have called what they were _fraternizing._ He didn’t know why in Heaven he did that.

It was so much more than that.

He knew that much at least.

Decades were so meaningless to immortal creatures. And yet those decades where Crowley wouldn’t speak to him dragged on and on, the droning beat of a very slow drum reminding him every second that he could be having a marvelous time enjoying a fine dinner and and even finer glass of wine with exquisite company if he hadn’t said something _so very stupid_ to his very best friend.

And then Crowley saved him — and his books — from the Nazis in that church, burning himself on consecrated ground in the process.

Aziraphale didn’t really have much of a choice after that. He gave Crowley what he wanted, and just needed to have faith that the demon was telling the truth about why he wanted it.

“Do you believe in soulmates?” Aziraphale asked Crowley the night the antichrist was delivered onto Earth and they had gotten so incredibly drunk.

“Huh? Oh, eh, yeah,” Crowley responded, lifting his glass to his lips and taking a long drink. Red wine clung in a delicate sheen to his lips and Aziraphale couldn’t draw his eyes away from it. “’Course I do.”

“You do?” On some level, Aziraphale had hoped that Crowley would say no, and the conversation would end there.

“Why wouldn’t I? Demons don’t have ’em, ’course,” he said, licking the wine from his lips. “Couldn’t, could we? No souls.”

“But are you _sure?”_ Aziraphale pressed. “Absolutely _positive_ that demons don’t have soulmates?”

Crowley ran his hand through his shaggy red hair, knocking his glasses a little off kilter. He snatched them off his face and set them on the table, revealing those beautiful golden eyes that Aziraphale only got to see in times like this.

“Why’re you asking?”

Aziraphale looked down into his glass, intently studying the contents with fascination. “No reason. Curiosity. What were you saying earlier about — oh, what was it? — moths, maybe?”

He barely listened as Crowley started ranting about moths and how superfluous they were (“Already got butterflies! They’re just dowdy butterflies, Angel!”). All he could think about was how incredibly dense he had been for the last six thousand years.

It _couldn’t_ be.

Could it?

Maybe if Aziraphale hadn’t spent so long trying not to think about his soulmate and not to think about his relationship with Crowley, he might have realized that they could, possibly, be one and the same.

He was afraid of the truth that he knew in his very soul. Crowley was his soulmate, the one being he was always meant to be with, from the moment of their Creation. Perfect complements to each other. But Crowley was a demon, and he was an angel, and they _couldn’t_ be what God intended.

And yet…

They stopped Armageddon together. They stopped it and they survived their following trials and they dined at the Ritz and everything was perfect and beautiful and new.

And Aziraphale knew that he couldn’t wait any longer.

“Do you want to come inside?” Aziraphale asked, uncharacteristically timid when they reached the bookshop, miraculously still standing despite the ordeal that Crowley swears it went through. The antichrist child really was something.

“Of course, Angel,” Crowley said softly, his face soft and warm, practically glowing with joy at their newfound position.

They got out of the Bentley, the streets of Soho strangely quiet as humanity decided that they would all rather stay home this evening and spend time with their friends and family.

Aziraphale hesitated at the door to the bookshop.

“Angel, I can—” Crowley began, but was cut off when Aziraphale surged forward and kissed him.

An electric tingle, bright and blue and wonderful pulsed through his entire being. Through his Earthly body and his wings on the spiritual plane and his very soul.

It felt so _right._

“Crowley, I think you’re my soulmate,” Aziraphale blurted out as he pulled back. “I’ve thought it for a long time — or, well, not that long, in the grand scheme of it all. What’s long when you’ve lived for thousands of years, I supposed — but I was afraid. So afraid to say anything, to act on it. Heaven says that there aren’t soulmates anymore, but I _know_ they’re wrong, Crowley. I know because you _have_ to be my soulmate, my dear. I’ve never been so sure about anything in my entire life.”

Crowley just stared at him, dumbstruck.

“Please, Crowley,” Aziraphale begged. “Please tell me that you feel the same.

Crowley couldn’t find the words.

(He’d never been particularly verbose. Not in the way Aziraphale was.)

So he simply leaned forward and kissed Aziraphale with the same passion and hunger that Aziraphale had kissed him with.

“’Course I do, Angel,” he muttered into Aziraphale’s lips, unable to bring himself to pull back more than a millimeter. “Feel the same. Always have. Been waiting.”

They would wait no more.

**Author's Note:**

> The title of the fic comes from Passion Pit’s _[Better Things](https://youtu.be/FwdgFa788OM)_. This won’t be the last time this month I steal a lyric from one of their songs as a title. It definitely isn’t the first time I’ve used their lyrics.
> 
> As always, thanks to my fiancée for reading through and giving her stamp of approval.


End file.
